2021 in Review

January: ABC Animals

I enjoyed practicing with my favorite brush (the chalk brush by @jingsketch, which remains one of my top brushes and is used in a good majority of my artwork). The repetitiveness of this project was a great help in honing some techniques.

February: ABC Birds

I enjoyed the January ABC series so much that I decided to try another, this time with birds. And I was SO tired of drawing feathers by the end! 🙂 But it let me further develop the techniques from the previous month.

March: March of Robots

Turned the official prompt list into a little story about a lonely robot named En making a new friend. I doubt I’ll ever again attempt to illustrate what amounted to a 31 page picture book in a month, but I’m glad I had the opportunity. Drawing the same two characters over and over was great practice for future children’s books I plan on illustrating.

April: ABC Cute Critters

After the monumental project that was March of Robots, I was happy to return to the much more steady and familiar pace of drawing another set of ABC animals. This time, cutesy rather than semi-realistic.

May: reMAYk & Plants

I tried hosting two overlapping challenges at once: a plants challenge (with one prompt per week), and a “reMAYk” challenge (taking a older piece of art and recreating it). I learned that hosting two challenges at the same time was way too daunting, and also that I enjoy recreating old pieces (just wait until August).

June: 15-Minute Sketches

The month of the 15-minute sketches. We were packing to move cross-country and I also thought I’d be illustrating a huge project which ended up not working out (at least at the time). The time limit on these sketches helped me learn to be ok with mistakes and just loosen up a bit when it came to my art. Because often there wasn’t enough time to go back and fix it! 🙂

July: Based on Old Sketches

To help speed things up a bit since we were still packing, I based July’s drawings on old sketches (saving a bit of time each day since I didn’t have to sketch out that day’s drawing). It was fun giving life to these sketches, especially some that were several years old.

August: Recreating Art

Still in the middle of prepping for the cross-country move. Picking out older pieces to redraw helped speed up each day’s drawing: the composition, colors, etc. were already chosen; I just had to redraw it using newer techniques. It was satisfying to be able to go back and “fix” some older drawings or see what they’d look like with a newer style.

September: Sketchtember

The month of the cross-country move! It was fortunate that it timed out during a month-long sketching challenge. There are some in here that will probably be redrawn someday.

October: Inktober

I attempted to create a story based on the official Inktober prompt list, but it ended up becoming too daunting a project (though I still plan on finishing Raven’s tale!). I spent the second half of the month following the prompt list, sometimes in black and white and sometimes in color. Experimented with some brushes.

November: Draw DiNovember

So many days filled with dinosaurs! (With a username that includes “-saurus”, can you tell that I love this month?). Since the subject remains the same throughout November, this challenge allowed me to experiment with a variety of styles, techniques, and brushes – from cartoony happy dinos to these landscape pieces that were so fun to create!

December: Winter Art

I’ve been calling December the “Holiday Hybrid” month, since almost every day combines prompts from several holiday and winter prompt lists. For example, this drawing combined “Eurasier,” “Build a Snowman,” “Winter Wonderland,” and “Snowman.” Mixing prompt lists like this was a fun challenge… I’m planning to do the same next December!

On to 2022!

Looking forward to seeing where my art journey goes in 2022.

This quote from Anne of Green Gables summarizes my feelings on the
start of a new year perfectly:

I wonder how the road beyond it goes.

L.M. Montgomery

Thanks for all your support!

Sarah